Liberal leadership candidate Justin Trudeau kicked off his bid to energize the country’s youth in a Sikh seniors’ centre in Calgary on Wednesday. More than 400 people packed into the basement of the Dashmesh Culture Senior Citizen Society to hear the largely platitudinous stump speech Mr. Trudeau first unveiled on Tuesday when he announced his leadership intentions in Quebec. He did throw in a few lines for the crowd, in a city that bore the brunt of his father’s National Energy Program in the ’80s. The Post’s Jen Gerson documents the moment in history:

11:54: It’s standing-room only in the centre, making it impossible to manoeuvre to the refreshments — deep-fried pakora and bright orange curled desserts called lalebi. The MC steps up to the microphone to announce a hat is about to be passed around. Please place change into it.

[np-related /]

REUTERS/Todd Korol

12:03: In a stunning reversal from Monday, it’s snowing in Calgary. Justin Trudeau walks in as K’naan’s Wavin’ Flag is blasted — a song about the rapper’s experience as a refugee fleeing war-torn Somalia, a not-at-all appropriate theme for the current state of the Liberal Party.

12:07: Stealing a line from John Diefenbaker, Mr. Trudeau praises the assembled: “Sometimes it feels like the only thing protecting Liberals in Calgary are the gaming laws.” It’s Alberta. We’re working on those, too.

12:08: “You’re not here because it makes you popular. You’re not Liberals in Calgary because it helps you network, or it gets you in good with your brother in law.” No kidding. “You care about building a better camera. Canada. Camera,” he slips. The crowd squeals in delight. “You know what a Freudian slip is. It’s when you say one thing and mean your mother.”

12:10: We can be assured Mr. Trudeau is in favour of diversity, medicare, an independent foreign policy, troops, empowering young people, choices, First Nations people, balanced budgets, the constitution and liberty. Noted.

12:13: “Twenty years ago, I was the first graduating class in university to get email. I was the last generation of pre-Google high school teachers. And our kids won’t ever know there was a world before Blackberry.” Blackberry? Try Android, old man. This guy’s been in Parliament too long.

THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jeff McIntosh

12:16: And then came the lead item for the local crowd: “I promise I will never use the wealth of the west as a wedge to gain votes in the east. It is wrong to use our natural wealth to divide Canadians against one another. It was the wrong way to govern in Canada in the past, it is the wrong way today and it will be the wrong way in the future. It’s not the politics of division that helps make Canada strong. You can get elected by dividing but you can’t really govern all that well.”

12:17: Mr. Trudeau further explained that he is not NDP leader Thomas Mulcair: “There’s not a country in the world that would find 170 billion barrels of oil under the ground and leave them there. There is not a province in this country that would find 170 billion barrels of oil and leave it in the ground.” See, see, no beard. No orange.

I promise I will never use the wealth of the west as a wedge to gain votes in the east

12:28: Mr. Trudeau ends his speech to enthusiastic but brief chants of his name. “Let us rededicate ourselves to the gloriously improbably work in progress that is Canada.” He likes that, too.

12:47: The media have escaped a hall so overcrowded it would make the fire inspector apoplectic. Braving drizzle and snow, they’ve huddled in a circle outside. Mr. Trudeau appears in a blazer and collared shirt, bearing neither tie nor winter coat. He equivocated on the Northern Gateway Pipeline, and added he has environmental concerns about the development of the oilsands, but distanced himself from the energy sins of his father. “I have nothing to do with the National Energy Program…I was 10 years old.” A likely story.

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